Even though it’s only margin of error it will cheer the Tories The only real changes in tonight’s January ICM poll for the Guardian are LAB down 2 with the LDs up – both moves within the margin of error. After a poor polling start to the year the Tories will be pleased that ICM has such a close margin which will give them a boost. Exactly a year ago the first ICM of 2013 had CON 33/LAB 38/LD 15….
LAB voters more likely to turn out where it matters We’ve said it many times before but it is worth saying again. To maximise a party’s votes:seats ratio the best thing you can do is perform differently in different sorts of seats. Just look at the LAB vote GE2010 vote share changes in the chart above. There’s a variation of nearly 6% between the seats where it best performed compared with the worst. The categories are worked out by the…
The general election is sixteen months away and the polls are going to be increasingly important. The biggest in terms of volume of output is, of course, YouGov which carries out five surveys each week – four for the Sun and one for the Sunday Times. Sometimes these get reported at other times they don’t. I thought it quite a good idea to continue highlighting interesting single polls but also to record a weekly average so we’ll be a able…
Nick Clegg on Andrew Marr show http://t.co/DZNREnCGSu — PolPics (@PolPics) January 12, 2014 Clegg makes the case for a further coalition It was Nick Clegg’s turn this morning to tour the radio and TV studios and his most interesting line was this from 5Live:- “Actually, if you look at some of the polls, there’s polls suggesting more people want another coalition of one description or another than they want a single party government. And by the way, I think they’re…
http://t.co/Mjk8tWGtRK http://t.co/fvMSatzc3U — PolPics (@PolPics) January 12, 2014 Will Mitchell be resigning this year anyway? The guilty plea in the trial of the PC who falsely made up evidence about the Plebgate affair has been used by Andrew Mitchell’s friends as vindication of his position. It’s not quite that – if he wasn’t there then the substance of what was said remains disputed – but it hasn’t done anything for the police case. Demands for Mitchell’s reinstatement to cabinet would…
http://t.co/Vru6eBegqP http://t.co/ZAEV366pJS — PolPics (@PolPics) January 11, 2014 @AndrewCooper__ @LordAshcroft I hope you'll both join me in urging all good Tories in Wyenshawe and Sale to vote UKIP #CountryB4Party — Toby Young (@toadmeister) January 11, 2014 An interesting development in the past week has been a move by Tony Young to encourage CON>UKIP and UKIP>CON tactical voting in key marginal seats. Such schemes have been seen before between the reds and yellows but this is the first I’ve seen from…
Has the Chancellor just set the terms of debate through to 2015? Popular memory recalls George Osborne’s 2012 Budget as the Omnishambles. Ed Miliband’s description was a little unfair, but only a little: any political event where opponents gain traction out of three separate criticisms of it is a PR shambles, whatever its other merits. It’s also – wrongly – remembered as the defining moment of the parliament in polling terms, from which Labour benefitted from a step-change increase. Actually,…
(Innocent Abroad has been posting on PB for nearly 10 years and was the first to coin the term OGH. He’s now joined the guest slot writing team) Expect turnout to be lower next time One of the attractions of betting on politics, perhaps, is that, unlike, say, betting on horseracing, there are no rules: no authority – other than the law itself – to determine what is or is not improper conduct. It should therefore be borne in mind…